1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus for protecting the copyright of digital information, preventing forging and illegal copying thereof, a method therefor and a memory medium storing such method.
2. Related Background Art
With the recent remarkable progress in computer and network technology, various digital information (for example text data, image data, audio data etc.) are being handled in computers and in networks.
In such environment, the user can easily process the digital information and can also easily reproduce information same as the original.
Therefore, in order to protect the copyright of such digital information, there is being developed a technology of embedding, in the digital information itself, copyright information or user information relating to the digital information as digital watermark information.
Such digital watermarking technology is intended to apply a predetermined process to the digital information such as image data or audio data, and to embed certain information into such digital information so as to be invisible to the user.
The copyright owner of the digital information can obtain the copyright information or the user information of the digital information by extracting the digital watermark information therefrom, and can trace the illegal copy.
For embedding the digital watermark information, there are known following two methods: the first method includes embedding in the space area of the digital information, while the second method includes embedding in the frequency area of the digital information.
However there has not yet been established a technology of efficiently determining the method for embedding or extracting the digital watermark information into or from the digital information.
In consideration of the foregoing, the principal object of the present invention is to provide a technology for efficiently controlling the method for embedding the digital watermark information into the digital information or for extracting such digital watermark information.
Another object of the present invention is to enable, in case the above-mentioned digital information has components of different kinds, individual management of the digital watermark information and the information representing the method for embedding the digital watermark information (or method for detecting such information).
The foregoing objects can be attained, according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, by an information processing apparatus capable of embedding digital watermark information into digital information, comprising:
input means for inputting digital information including signal components of plural kinds; and
control means for controlling the method for embedding the digital watermark information into the signal component of a first kind contained in the signal components of said plural kinds, based on the signal component of a second kind contained in the signal components of said plural kinds.
According to another preferred embodiment, there is provided an information processing apparatus capable of embedding digital watermark information into digital information, comprising:
input means for inputting digital information including signal components of plural kinds; and
control means for controlling whether or not to embed the digital watermark information into the signal component of a first kind contained in the signal components of said plural kinds, based on the signal component of a second kind contained in the signal components of said plural kinds.
According to still another preferred embodiment, there is provided an information processing apparatus comprising:
input means for inputting digital information in which digital watermark information is embedded, wherein said digital information is composed of signal components of plural kinds; and
discrimination means for discriminating the embedding method of the digital watermark information into the signal component of a first kind, based on the signal component of a second kind contained in said digital information and different from said first kind.
According to still another preferred embodiment, there is provided an information processing apparatus comprising:
input means for inputting digital information in which digital watermark information is embedded, wherein said digital information is composed of signal components of plural kinds; and
discrimination means for discriminating whether the digital watermark information is embedded in the signal component of a first kind, based on the signal component of a second kind contained in said digital information and different from said first kind.
Still other objects of the present invention, and the features thereof, will become fully apparent from the following description of the embodiments, to be taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.